Like a Feebas out of Water
by elpachosan
Summary: In the dead of night, Leonard finds himself lost in a mysterious forest. Can he handle being thrust into a world of dangers and strange creatures? Well, maybe, but it won't be easy. He's new to all this, after all.
1. A Warm Unwelcome

I didn't awaken, exactly; or if I did, it was too sudden to notice. I was lying on the side of a dirt path, lit by the moon directly overhead. Tall, dense trees lined each side of the path, surrounding it in deep shadows. A slow crackling noise was the only thing I could hear.

For a few seconds, I simply took in the sounds while I stared at the sky, not thinking much of it. After a moment, though, some part of me realized that I should be concerned; and having realized that, adrenaline flooded through me as I leapt to my feet, eyes darting around to catch as much as I could.

The path was empty aside from me. No boogeyman presented itself, and realizing this the adrenaline slowly drained from me, leaving only the traces of panic behind. Absent an immediate threat, I was left with the obvious: I was somewhere deeply unfamiliar. I had gone to sleep in my room, so far as I could recall. Could I have sleepwalked? It seemed unlikely, as I didn't recognize the types of tree surrounding the path. I wasn't much of a tree enthusiast-arborist?-but even so, if they were within walking distance of my house I probably would have noticed them.

Well, no matter how I'd gotten here, the important thing was to get back out again. Both directions of the path looked more or less the same, so I picked one at random and headed along it. The path was a winding one, not allowing you to see very far before the next turn, so I stuck to the middle of the path, as far from the looming shadows as I could manage.

It was around one such corner that I discovered a source of the crackling sound, which had persisted all the while. A brown crablike creature, with mushrooms sprouting from its back, wandered about the path, snapping twigs and branches in its mouth. The thing was fairly large, as far as crabs went; a foot long, maybe. This left me feeling both more and less relieved. If it was just weird crabs, then the noises were nothing to worry about; but all the same, I had absolutely never seen anything like it, which meant I could be very far from home. Regaining my former pace, I decided to simply walk past it.

I really should have known better. As I approached, it whirled to face me, spraying some kind of powder directly into my face. I coughed, or attempted to, but my body froze up and I fell, slamming facefirst into the ground. As I tried and failed to move, I could hear the crab approach me. Once it reached me, it paused for a second; and then I felt a spike of agony through my arm. The pain broke whatever effect the powder had held over me, and I stood, whirling to face the creature. Apparently, that was enough to scare it. Dripping blood from it's claw, it quickly scurried into the treeline.

After taking a moment to wrap my shirt around the sliced arm (thankfully, not a deep cut), I picked up a large stick off the trail. The next crab was getting driven off, no matter how innocent it looked.

Then my body locked up again, sending me plummeting to the ground. It seemed the powder lingered, even if it didn't totally paralyze you.


	2. Batter Up

A few minutes later, I heard an awful screeching noise come from further down the path. My first instinct was to avoid the sound, remembering the crab, but it was followed by an anguished and clearly human shout. I decided to cautiously proceed, and see if I could help them.

Once I rounded the next corner, the situation became both clear and alarming. On one side of the path, a tall and fairly large man stood, wiping at an injury on his scalp. In front of him paced a strange creature, about half his size; pink and quadripedal, with a long tail that moved slowly back and forth. On the other side of the path, three oversized bats fluttered about. Each was attempting to dive at the man, only to be repelled by the man's pet as it sprayed water at them from its mouth. Several more bats littered the ground, soaked through and unmoving.

One bat, rather than diving in, screeched as I'd heard from before. Even from some distance away, the sound was awful. I was far enough away that it only left a ringing in my ears. The man and his pink thing, though, both staggered, the latter tripping and falling to the ground. The next bat dove, biting into the fallen creature's skin, then retreated as it stood again.

A blast of water struck the third bat as it arced in slightly after the second, and it fell from the sky, landing among its already-fallen companions. The remaining two bats swooped-the pink thing, still moving dizzily, missed its next shot, water passing directly between them. The bats latched onto it, sinking in their fangs.

A ray of red light shot from the ball the man held, and a moment later, the pink creature vanished, leaving the bats fluttering atop nothing. After a moment of confusion, I decided it didn't matter what exactly happened there; the man was now alone. The bats recovered quickly from the sudden change, swooping toward the man. Running forward, I waited for an opportunity- _there_ , a bat fluttered off of him, regrouping for another strike-and swung my stick at full force.

It wasn't a full on blow, just clipping the wing, but it was enough. It soared backward, ramming into the ground, and didn't get up again. The last of them fluttered off the man, and darted into the shadows of the treeline-maybe realizing it was outnumbered, or just having slightly more survival instinct than the rest of them. I turned to face the man, who grinned widely at me in spite of the blood running down his face.

"Why thank ya, stranger," the man said. "Rest of my team's recuperatin, thought my little Slowpoke'd do. There's a lesson right there, don't underestimate the wilds, no sir."

Seeing the look on my face, and possibly realizing how little of that I understood, he continued, "Name's Tom. So, who might you be then? And what brings you into Ilex Forest in the night?"

"I'm Leonard," I said, "and I didn't..." It occurred to me that saying I woke up here inexplicably would draw more attention than I wanted to my situation. "Well, I didn't really intend to be out here."

He didn't look like he believed that, but nodded anyway. "Well, Leonard, I do owe ya. I'd probably be a fair bit more banged up than I am, fighting off two Zubat on my lonesome. Your Pokemon are worn down, I take it? No reason to charge in otherwise."

I didn't know what he meant, but I nodded anyway.

"Well then," he continued, "come along to Azalea Town with me, and we'll get that taken care of. Get you some treatment for that arm of yours, while you're there, and it'll give me some time to think on how I can repay you."


	3. Deal Struck

Azalea Town was a rather small place. The majority of buildings were single-story wooden constructions, spread haphazardly throughout, with curving roads connecting them as best they could. There was one three-story building, also wooden, with a front made largely of glass with an insignia in the center. When I asked Tommy about it, he said it was Bugsy's Gym. He said the name like it carried some import, so I nodded and pretended I understood. Lastly, there was a single building, two stories tall and somewhat wider across, made mostly of brick. This building had the same insignia overhead, and it was there that we were headed.

Once inside, it became clear that it was some sort of medical facility. The woman at the front desk (who had pink hair, oddly enough) called out as we entered.

"Rather late, isn't it, Tom?"

"Evenin' to you, too, Joy." He placed his red-and-white ball on the counter. "My slowpoke needs patching up, and me and the boy could use some help as well."

She frowned. "The machine's busted again, I'm afraid," she said, picking up the ball.

"Again? That's the third time in as many months, innit?"

"Well, nobody knows how to maintain it. We have to call in somebody from Goldenrod every time..."

I tuned them out, glancing around the place. The insignia, which looked like the red-and-white ball Tom had, was nearly everywhere. The magazines next to the chairs each had it somewhere on their cover, plus it was on the buildings. They were probably important somehow.

"Leonard?" Tom said.

I brought back my attention to the conversation. "I'm sorry?"

"She says one o' the nurses has a Chansey. You want to pass her your Pokemon?"

Crap. Well, no point lying about it, it'd be too obvious. "Funny story, um, I actually don't have any."

Tom gaped at me. The nurse, Joy, was more restrained, but her eyebrows climbed noticeably. "What are ya doin out in Ilex, alone, in the _middle_ of the _night_ , if ya ain't even a trainer, boy?"

"Well, that's, uh..." I hemmed and hawed, trying to come up with an explanation. "Well, I never really had an opportunity to have a pokey-mon..." _Good start, now justify that,_ "my parents wouldn't allow it, you know?" _Technically true, since neither they nor I had ever heard of the thing._

Tom narrowed his eyes, his gape replaced with a deep frown. "Ah, _hippies_ ," he spat the word. "No offense, boy, but I can't see eye to eye with your folks if they think the balance of nature or some mumbo jumbo is more important than keeping people safe." He turned to Joy. "Just my slowpoke, then." She nodded and walked out the door behind the desk.

Glad to see that the explanation worked well enough, I jumped on it. "I agree, but I couldn't really go against them, right?"

He nodded. "True that, but they ain't here now. Tell you what, I might be able to set you up, favors for favors."

"What did you have in mind?"

"I know this fella Daichi, real nice guy, and he's had a Pokemon that he's been looking to trade off for a while now. Can't take care of it, apparently, too busy. Wants to make sure it goes to a good person, though. Anyway, you're nice enough, no matter what I think of your upbringin'." I nodded. "So, he makes Pokeballs for a living, and it takes up a lot of his time. I bet if you worked as his assistant, and he'd still pay you, no worries there, but he'd get you started as well. An Oddish, I think he had."

"So," I said, "just to be clear, you want me to work for him, and I'd get the normal wages plus a bonus?" I chuckled. "I can't see any problems with that."

He grinned. "Glad to hear it. I'll introduce you in the morning."

Joy entered again from the other room. "Here's your Slowpoke, Tom. Now, let's patch up those injuries of yours, shall we?"


	4. Unpleasant Competition

A few days later, I'd met with Daichi. Daichi was a lean-looking fellow, narrow-faced and attentive. After hearing about the events in Ilex Forest (or Tom's version, anyway, which painted me as slightly more heroic than I really was), he'd agreed to take me on as an assistant while he decided whether I'd be a good recipient of his Oddish. For the time being, I'd been living with Tom, who'd been willing to delay rent until I'd officially gotten started. During that time, I'd learned a fair bit about what exactly Pokemon were from asking careful questions about the man's Slowpoke (the pokemon he'd used in Ilex) and Graveler (who, he noted, he'd absolutely be bringing with him in the future). As such, I could probably pretend I knew what I was talking about, if Daichi asked me any questions about that.

Today was my first day. With a deep breath, I knocked on the door. After a moment, Daichi opened it, and nodded. "Right on time," he said, grabbing a basket from next to the door. "We'll start you off by gathering the Apricorns."

I followed him to the outskirts of Ilex Forest, until we came to a heavily-leafed tree, with colored bulbs hanging from the branches. "First question," he said, "you don't have any Pokemon already, right?" I nodded. "Good. When you first get a Pokemon, don't let them get near this type of tree. Apricorns store magic, which is why we use them to hold Pokemon, which are made of magic. While they're attached to the tree, though, they also consume magic for energy. Mix that up and you get a sad story for everyone involved. Got it?" He continued, before I could respond. "When I say it absorbs magic, I mean all magic. If you're a magic user...?" I shook my head. "Okay, well if you were, you'd be running dry until after you were done for the day. On the bright side, getting drained all the time will build up your reserves, in case you ever decide to make use of that."

He reached up into the tree, grabbed the attached branch with his other hand, then yanked, detaching the bulb. "There, that's one. You'll be doing that today. They're attached firmly, so make sure not to break the branch along with it. Once you've done this tree, head deeper into Ilex forest to look for any other trees to harvest. Stick to areas with other people in them, since you can't defend yourself against wild Pokemon. Come back at noon for a lunch break, then again before sundown and you'll be done. Any questions?"

I shook my head. "Yank out the apricorn while keeping the branch in place. Search Ilex once this tree's done, stay safe, break for lunch, finish before nightfall. Got it."

"Good. I'll be back at the store if you need me." With that, he headed off.

The first apricorn I touched sent a wave of coldness through me. That must have been the magic drain, which surprised me. I hadn't thought it would do anything, since magic wasn't a thing back on Earth-and I had verified, now, that I wasn't on Earth any more. I'd checked a world map, and it had been unrecognizable. I got used to the chill fairly quickly, though, and fell into a rhythm while I worked.

"Hi!" A voice shouted from the ground below. I looked down from my position in the tree. A stern-looking older man stood at the base of his tree, along with a young girl-his daughter, maybe? It was the latter who had spoken, waving enthusiastically with a grin on her face. "I never met you before!"

The man frowned. "Quiet for one moment, Maizie." He turned to me. "Although she is correct; you are new. I should warn you, if you intend to produce Pokeballs from those, there are already two businesses in town-you are unlikely to have success."

I nodded. "Yeah, I'm working for Daichi. Do you make Pokeballs as well?"

He glared at me. "I am Kurt." He spoke with the air of someone stating the obvious.

That gave me pause for a moment. _Did I know a Kurt? I didn't, I only really knew Tom, Joy and Daichi so far._ "Is that a yes, then?"

"I do not make Pokeballs. I sculpt specialized capture balls used throughout Johto, drawing out the full potential of each and every Apricorn. My work has saved lives in the heat of battle."

"Oh...Okay, then." _He's clearly on edge. Commercial rivalry?_ "Well, I'm just about done here, so I'll take these and go." Swinging down from the tree, I grabbed my basket and headed into the forest, ready to find another tree.

"Bye!" Maizie shouted. Kurt shushed her.


	5. Double Jeopardy

After speaking with Daichi once I'd brought back the apricorn harvest, he confirmed that he and Kurt got along rather poorly; so for the next few days, I avoided that particular tree, instead harvesting from deeper in the forest. There seemed to be about ten or so trainers who wandered the path during the daytime, and occasionally the sounds of fighting could be heard in the distance. I'd been assured, after the first time this happened, that it was a common enough occurrence and not worth worrying about. Since they traveled together, there was no real threat of them getting overwhelmed or put in any danger.

Overall, this seemed to be the natural state of affairs, and so at first I thought nothing was wrong. After a few days, though, things began to change. The trainers seemed to spend more time walking the trail; their casual wandering began to look more like a steady patrol, and lighthearted conversations and grins gave way for muttering among themselves, wary looks on their faces. Tom said that the wild pokemon had been getting rather aggressive, but was reluctant to say more. I didn't press him on it.

On the bright side, harvesting had apparently gone a lot faster with somebody dedicated to that job alone. Daichi said that, after one more day of harvesting, there'd be enough apricorns to work with until the situation calmed down, and he'd have me focus elsewhere. For the last batch, I was gathering from a tree some distance from the Slowpoke Well.

"Do you have a moment?"

A young boy stood at the base of the tree, with purple layered hair and carrying a bug-catching net. My first instinct was to wonder what he was doing out alone, a reaction that was quickly dispelled when I noticed his belt full of Pokeballs. _A prolific trainer, then?_

"Sure." I climbed down from the tree and set my basket down on the ground. "What can I help you with?"

"Are you aware of the disturbance in Ilex Forest?" He seemed stiff, on edge.

"A little bit. Something about the pokemon changing their behavior?"

He nodded, and unclipped one of his pokeballs. "Yes." With a flash of light, a Metapod appeared in front of him. "Minor variations happen now and again, and bug types in particular can change both form and disposition rapidly, but this aggression is widespread enough that it's likely outside interference."

The gist of the conversation was starting to unnerve me. "So, uh...what exactly-"

"Metapod, string shot."

Before I could even react, I found myself locked in place, bound by a dense spray of sticky thread.

"I apologize in advance if you're not involved," he continued. "Name's Bugsy. I've mostly heard good things about you, but the timing of this is too close to your arrival." He unclipped and released another pokemon, a person-sized dragonfly. "Yanmega, carry him. We're heading back to town."

The shock faded enough to let me regain my speech by the time I was lifted in its pincers. "Hold on, how could I have...? I mean, I don't even _have_ a pokemon."

He sighed, and began to walk back along the trail, Yanmega carrying me close behind. "Honestly, you're probably not the cause of this. 'Probably' isn't good enough, though."

"So why focus here? Aren't there better things to investigate?" Truthfully, I was feeling overwhelmed, and that made me sound plaintive. This didn't seem _fair_ , that I was being brought in for some random angry wildlife.

He shook his head. "I already have people canvassing the forest in groups. We can't afford to let the problem slip past us-at this rate, we'll be cut off from Goldenrod."

That, I hadn't expected. "It's really that bad?"

"It is. One group got jumped by a horde of beedrill yesterday. If not for some lucky type matchups-"

He cut off suddenly. A moment later, I knew what had distracted him: a vile stench was drifting through the air. Several flashes of light heralded the rest of his pokemon being released, too varied to describe.

"Vespiquen, eyes in the sky." The black-and-yellow honeycombed pokemon fluttered upward, vanishing from sight past the tree line. Bugsy pulled a long white cloth from his pack, and tied it around his nose and mouth. "Pinsir, take the lead. Heracross, bring up the rear." The two giant beetles moved in position, and he moved over to me, carrying a second cloth. "I don't know what the smell is, but there's a dozen kinds of spore that can ruin your day. Be careful not to lose this." He quickly tied the cloth, blocking out the worst of the smell. "Move toward Azalea, everyone. We can't afford to wait."


	6. Reckless Maneuvers

We marched forward in silence, or rather, they marched and I was carried. The only sound was that of the occasional stick cracking underfoot-even the usual sounds of the forest were entirely absent. The smell got worse as we carried forward, until it was almost as bad as it had been before without the cloth.

Bugsy called us to a stop at a small clearing. Halfway across, a wall of thick, purple dust hung in the air. "Poison powder," he said. "There's no going through that; we'll have to go around."

"Why is it there?" I asked.

He turned to the left, and started walking parallel to the blockade. His pokemon adjusted to maintain their formation. "Many of the wild pokemon here can learn how to produce the stuff. Maybe they fought among themselves."

"So much of it, though?" When that wild Paras I'd met on the first day had used a powder attack on me, there hadn't been very much of it by comparison-the attack was smaller than I was.

Rather than respond, he simply continued walking. Did he not know? Or was he refusing to talk to his 'prisoner'? I wasn't sure-in the position Yanmega was carrying me, blood was starting to run to my head, and it was a little difficult to think. Either way, we shortly stopped moving again. Looking up, I saw another wall of dust blocking our progress, green in color this time.

"Sleep powder," Bugsy said. "What...?"

Something about the situation struck me, as dizzy as I was starting to get. "We're getting boxed in," I said.

He turned to me, a suspicious look on his face. "Beg pardon?"

"These clouds are, uh..." I took a moment to put my thoughts together. "They're holding us in place, so we can't leave the forest."

His look turned speculative, and he spun to inspect the wall. "Wild pokemon wouldn't be smart enough to execute a strategy like that," he said, "too many moving parts. Now that you mention it, though..." After a moment of contemplation, he nodded to himself. "All right, we're going to wait for Vespiquen. Once we have more information, we'll proceed."

"All right, great." I nodded haphazardly. "So, while we're waiting, uh...could I go ahead and stand up? This is really uncomfortable."

He looked me over. "Sure, that should be harmless. Yanmega, drop him." He caught me as I suddenly fell, then pushed me to a standing position. "Just don't try to remove the strings while we wait."

We stood in silence some distance away from the cloud, biding our time. As promised, I kept still rather than risk disturbing my bindings. Bugsy, Pinsir and Heracross each stood on guard, keeping watch in a given direction. No wild pokemon leapt out to intercept us; nor, in fact, did any even wander through the area. It seemed as though we were completely alone, and it felt that way for the next few minutes, until Vespiquen finally descended from above the trees.

"Vespiquen, report," Bugsy said.

"We are currently trapped by several clouds of various powders," Vespiquen replied, in a high-pitched, lilting voice. I blinked in surprise- _it could talk?_ -but she continued despite my confusion. "The clouds are being reinforced by one of four Vileplumes, each commanded by a trainer wearing all black. One trainer saw me in the sky, and released a pokemon which seemed to be an Ice or Water type, at which point I retreated."

Bugsy nodded. "Understood. Yanmega, begin speed boosting."

Yanmega lifted off from the ground and began to beat its wings, faster and faster. Bugsy approached me, and began to remove my bindings. "The trainers Vespiquen mentioned are likely responsible for the recent disturbance," he said. "My apologies for the suspicion. You will be free to go, once we escape the situation."

"Um, no problem," I said. "So, how are we getting out?"

He glanced over to Yanmega, who was now zipping around us. "Almost there," he muttered. "We can't fight the trainers, not when we're in their trap and heavily outnumbered. The plan is the same as before-return to Azalea Town and make our preparations there. Speaking of which. Pinsir, Heracross, return."

" Vespiquen!" He barked. "Air Slash, on the powder!"

Vespiquen thrust her arms forward, and a blade of wind rushed forward, parting the cloud.

"Brace yourself, Leonard! Yanmega, get him out!"

Before I could respond, I was suddenly launched forward by the small of my back, wind bending my spine backward. A moment later, I hit the ground, tumbling across it before skidding on my face, coming to a stop a moment later.

"Ow," I mumbled around a mouthful of dirt. Once the dizziness wore off, I sat up.

I was on the far side of the sleep powder, now, and Slowpoke Well was within sight. Unfortunately, so was a large blue pokemon of some kind, with a red flower sprouting from its' head, and its trainer. _That's probably Vileplume, huh._ Both were running toward me.

"Vileplume!" The man shouted. _Yup._ "Sleep Powder!"

Bugsy flew between us, borne forward by Yanmega. Both passed directly through the dust, disrupting it, and a moment later, crashed to the ground. The trainer grinned nastily. "Well, that works too." He picked up Bugsy in a fireman's carry. "I'll just take this. Vileplume, remove him." With that, he turned and began to walk away. The Vileplume began to glow, and a small sphere of light began to swell in front of its hand.

 _Crap crap crap crap._ What could I do? Even if I somehow avoided the attack it was charging, I still couldn't rescue Bugsy at this rate. I had no pokemon available to handle this, and I couldn't get help from any of Bugsy's, he'd put them all back except for Yanmega and-ah!

"Vespiquen!" I shouted. "Rescue your trainer!" Vileplume twitched as I shouted, moving its arm-and the ball of light moved with it.

 _Ok, with any luck she heard me_ -a burst of wind shot past me, knocking over the trainer- _good, that's that sorted._ Vespiquen flew forward, and completely ignored the Vileplume, moving straight for Bugsy. _Oh. No help, huh?_

Well, then. How was I supposed to handle this? The ball of light was shaking now; I could only assume it was nearly finished doing whatever it was doing. If only there was some way I could handle a three-foot tall plant. _Actually no, hold that thought, I'm stupid._

I burst into a sprint toward the Vileplume. It had been getting closer while it charged, so it was easy to snatch off the ground. Ignoring its half-hearted flailing, I used my forearm to hold its body to my chest, and grabbed its arm. As I moved its arm, the light moved with it. _Well, that was surprisingly easy. Maybe it can't do other things while it's charging up? Now then, where to point this..._

Looking over at Vespiquen, I saw that she was launching narrow bursts of wind at some kind of seal. The seal didn't seem to care very much, responding with blue beams of light that froze wherever it touched. Vespiquen had a few patches of ice on its body already, and it seemed to be struggling to stay airborne. _Perfect._ "Hey Vespiquen, watch out!" I shouted, pointing the Vileplume's arm at the seal.

"What the fuck?" The trainer said. "You've got to be-"

The ball of light exploded outward, a massive beam firing toward them. Vespiquen fluttered out of the way, but the seal was clipped by it, and I adjusted my aim slightly to hit it head on. It was too much-after a moment of exposure, the seal dissolved into red light, and returned to its pokeball on the man's belt. Seizing the opportunity, Vespiquen knocked him flat with one more burst of wind. A moment later, the beam tapered off, and I immediately chucked the Vileplume as far as I could toward the woods.

"Do not move," Vespiquen said to the trainer. "You will be coming with us."

"Let's get going quick, before the others you saw get here," I said. "You keep him in line, and I'll carry Bugsy." So saying, I placed him over my shoulder.

She nodded to me. "Very well. I do not accept orders from any other than my trainer, but your plan is wise." She fluttered over to me and tapped a pokeball on Bugsy's belt, which absorbed the sleeping Yanmega, then returned to the downed trainer. "Get up. Drop your Pokeball belt on the ground and step away from it, then move. Otherwise, your wellbeing is forfeit."

Swearing under his breath, he complied. Vespiquen took the belt, and then we began to run toward Azalea Town.


	7. Curt Debriefing

Despite my earnest desire to get away from the forest quickly, I ran out of energy before reaching even the edge of town. Sprinting away with an unconscious Bugsy thrown over my shoulder was rather more strenuous than carrying a basket full of apricorns, it turned out. We were forced to slow to a walk.

"Humans are surprisingly feeble," Vespiquen stated, eyeing me. Despite the patches of ice which had yet to melt off her frame, she continued to hover at a steady pace.

"...Yeah?" I growled, panting from exertion. "Well...without this feeble human...your trainer would be gone, and you'd be up the river. So maybe...a little courtesy, eh?"

She paused in midair for a moment, then began to flutter forward again. "My apologies," she said. "Your aid was invaluable; I surely would have been unable to fight off both the Seel and the Vileplume alone."

"Arceus, spare me," her captive muttered. She blasted him with wind, shoving him forward.

"You will speak when spoken to," she said.

I lacked energy to continue the conversation, so we carried forward in silence for another few minutes, after which we reached the outskirts of Azalea proper.

"So," I gasped, "Where are we going?" By this point, my legs were on fire, and my lungs weren't faring much better.

Vespiquen mused for a moment, then nodded to herself. "I know of one of Bugsy's friends, who lives near here," she said. "We can stop there and recover."

The house she brought us to looked pretty much the same as most of the houses in Azalea; a single story wooden construction, with an angled roof and a window out front by the door. Keeping a close eye on the captive trainer, she strode forward and knocked on the door, three sharp raps in quick succession. After a moment, a familiar face peeked out the bottom of the window.

"Grandpa!" Maizie shouted. "Come quick!"

A moment later, Kurt swung the door open, clearly prepared to tell off whoever the intruder was. The words died on his lips as he began to take in the scene: Myself, carrying the still-unconscious Bugsy; Vespiquen, looking rather worse for wear, with a Pokeball belt around her honeycomb-like middle; and finally the man in all black. As his eyes finished scanning our little group, he came to a decision. "Maizie, go in the back yard and check on your Slowpoke."

"Aw," she whined, "but I wanna stay and say hi to mister tree-"

"Now!" he barked. She scampered away, presumably off to the back door. _Mister tree? Was that me, or Bugsy?_ "All right," he said. "All of you, get in here. Boy, get Bugsy on the couch. What's wrong with him?"

"He took a whiff of Sleep Powder," I said, putting the unconscious Gym Leader down, and a moment later collapsing myself. "Courtesy of the guy Vespy's keeping an eye on."

Kurt scowled. "Got it. One moment." He exited the living room, returning a moment later with two spray bottles of liquid, one of which he handed to Vespiquen, and a large coil of rope. "Here, that's a potion. Patch yourself up. This one," he shook the bottle he held, "is an awakening. Now, these don't work quite the same way on humans as they do on Pokemon, but..." he pried Bugsy's mouth open, and sprayed the substance in. A moment later, Bugsy jerked forward.

"Ugh!" He said. "I told you if I ever had that crap in my mouth again-" he broke off, and looked around. "Oh."

"Yeah," Kurt said, "Oh. Now that you're up and at 'em, explain why you decided to take an evening nap. Meanwhile, I'll be making sure our other visitor doesn't make any distractions."

While Kurt tied up the captive with rope, Bugsy explained the events leading up to our escape from being boxed in, ending with his attempt to have Yanmega launch us both out.

"Reckless," Kurt said. "You should've gone first, and had Yanmega go back for the boy afterward."

Bugsy shook his head. "You know I wouldn't do something like that, Kurt."

Kurt snorted. "I do know, you fool of a brat." Despite the words, there was fondness to his tone. "You've always been too selfless for your own good."

"And that's what I've needed to be, to keep the town safe. In any case, I'm far more interested in what happened afterward. How did you get out?"

I took over the explanation, with Vespiquen adding the occasional remark of her own. Kurt stopped me when I got to going after the Vileplume.

"Hold on a minute, boy-"

"Leonard," I replied.

He frowned for a moment, then said, "Leonard, then. You didn't actually go up against a fully evolved pokemon with your bare hands, did you?"

"He did," Vespiquen commented. "Circumstances made it the ideal choice-I don't know that I would have won without the redirected Solarbeam."

Kurt sighed. "For future reference, a better trainer would have just had it spew acid at you, or slice you up with razor-sharp leaves. Don't expect that trick to work out again. Your recklessness is contagious," he muttered to Bugsy.

Bugsy chuckled. "No, that's not my fault. Tom tells me that Leonard helped him fight off some Zubat when he first arrived here with naught but a stick."

Kurt tsked. "So it's a coincidence I've got a couple of buffoons under my roof, then. Very well." Turning serious, he continued, "All right, me and this mysterious trainer of ours are going to have a chat. Mind going outside for a few minutes?"

I didn't really like the sound of that, but when Bugsy nodded, I decided to follow him and Vespiquen to the backyard.

Maizie was lying next to her slowpoke on the grass, coloring in a little book in front of her. She looked up as she heard the door close behind us. "Mister tree!" She said, running up to me. _Well, that answers that._ "You were making Pokeballs before, right?"

"Nah, I was just helping collect the Apricorns."

"I do that sometimes! Grandpa says I don't have to, cause it makes me all shivery, but I like helping because I'm a helper, and helpers help!"

"Helpers help, huh?"

"Yeah! I'm gonna be a helper when I grow up, and I'll do even more helping, like Harry the Happiny! Hey, you wanna color with me?"

I looked back at Bugsy, pleading with my eyes. He smirked a bit, but came to my rescue anyway. "Where's my hello, Maizie? Did you not see me?"

"Hi, Mister Bugsy. You can color, too."

Having been thoroughly outwitted by Maizie, Bugsy and I helped her color a drawing of a Kangaskhan. Once the appeal of that wore off, she asked for a story, so we decided to tell her a friendlier version of what we'd been up to earlier.

"Stop right there, criminal!" Bugsy shouted, pointing at me dramatically. Vespiquen watched from the sidelines, a slight smile on her face. "Kakuna, get him!" Obligingly, his Kakuna sprayed a mess of string at me (thankfully much less sticky, this time).

"Nooo!" I wailed, throwing my head back. "I have been captured! Maizie, save me!"

"Okay," Maizie giggled. Standing up, she quickly tackled me.

"A trick!" I shouted, falling backward. "I've been bamboozled!"

Her sudden burst of laughter was interrupted as Kurt stepped outside.

"Oh, uh, hey," I said, curled awkwardly on the ground and covered in string.

Ignoring me, Kurt turned to Bugsy. "He was working for Team Rocket," he said. "They're back."


	8. Mixed Reception

"Hey, there, Leonard!" Tom said as I walked in through the door. His Graveler and Slowpoke chimed in as well, with nonsense noises that I assumed were greetings of some kind. "Coming back late today, aren'tcha?"

"Hmm," I replied. "Well, some things happened. There'll be an announcement on the TV in about an hour or so."

"Oh? We didn't run into anything useful on patrol earlier. Didja spot something out of the ordinary while you were pickin' apricorns?"

"You could say that, yeah." _You'd be understating it, but you could say it._ "Well, at least that's done for the time being. We've got more than enough to work with."

Despite having left the last basket I'd collected back in Ilex Forest when Bugsy had captured me, there would still be a bit of a surplus. Kurt had even offered some from his own stock to bring back: "despite your foolheadedness, you managed to rescue another fool I care about," was how he'd put it. I'd politely declined. The good will was enough for me, disguised as it was behind a layer of crotchety attitude.

Tom and I idly chatted about various things while we waited. Since Bugsy had asked me not to say anything until the broadcast went out, the conversation mostly focused on what he'd been up to. The large patrol group had, apparently, been a bit of a mess. The competitive trainers who were visiting kept trying to explore alone, and frequently got into arguments with the Rangers in the area, who insisted on strict regimentation. The trainers who worked for Bugsy's Gym sometimes fell on one side of the argument or the other, but were often smug about being local to the town. In the end, they had been slow to cover ground, and the one time anything interesting happened (they'd spotted a screen of stun spores, which I carefully didn't comment on when he mentioned it), they hadn't been able to decide on a single course of action before it dissipated.

A chime played from the TV, and we sat at the couch as the announcement began to play.

"Good evening, everyone," a particular grainy-looking woman in a police uniform said, standing at a podium with a single microphone attached to the top. (It was a fairly old TV, relative to what I was used to. It looked like it should have a VHS attached to it.) "You may be aware that as of late, there have been a number of disturbances in Ilex forest. Earlier today, the instigators of the incident were discovered to be sympathizers with the currently defunct Team Rocket. One is now in custody, and several more are being searched for as we speak." A picture of the man Vespiquen had captured appeared next to him on the screen. "If you see anyone wearing this uniform, please avoid them, and notify us at your earliest convenience. Additionally, we recommend against travelling through Ilex Forest until this issue is resolved. We hope to have the matter resolved quickly. Are there any questions?"

"Cianwood news, here. Officer Jenny, what are your plans for-"

Tom turned off the TV, a carefully neutral expression on his face. "So, ya ran into Team Rocket earlier."

I nodded.

"I see. I take it they didn't get involved with ya?"

"Well, that's not exactly true. They were going for Bugsy, I think, and since I was with him, I got caught in the crossfire." Thinking back to how he'd gotten caught by the sleep powder, I added, "Or maybe he got in the crossfire, I guess. Either way, we got out all right."

"So ya did. Very impressive." His expression remained implacable, to the point that it was starting to unnerve me.

"Uh, so," I said, "what's the deal with Team Rocket, anyway? I'm not really familiar with the details."

"They're a group that values people over pokemon," Tom said. "Lotsa people don't like their methods, and some people don't like their morals either."

"Oh." That was...not a terrible answer, but a suspiciously non-negative one. Given the pure revilement I'd heard in regards to them before, and that Tom was hardly one to hide his emotions, why was he being so restrained? He didn't agree with them, did he? No, that was ridiculous; he had pokemon of his own, after all.

But then, he had said that thing about my fake parents. What was it? _People who care about "nature's balance" don't have their priorities right?_ Something like that, anyway-my memory wasn't good enough to recall the exact words.

After a little more conversation, I couldn't glean anything more about it, and I went to sleep not knowing the answer.

* * *

"I'll have you carving Pokeballs today," Daichi said, sitting at his desk. "With unknowns running around the forest, there's no point trying to go out and collect anything."

He placed a single apricorn in front of me, along with a carving knife. As I began to reach for them, he barked, "Where are your pokemon?"

"Wha-I don't have any-"

"Assuming you have pokemon, where are they?"

It took me a moment to get it. "Oh! Uh, nowhere near the apricorns we're working on."

"Very good." He nodded approvingly. "Now, here's how you grip the knife while you work."

After explaining how to keep it angled so that you didn't risk cutting yourself, he demonstrated the method to make a pokeball. First, split the apricorn down the middle, then hollow out each half. Once the insides were emptied out, you recombined the halves, then carved away an indent to place a hinge, and another for the opening latch.

My first pokeball was genuinely atrocious. Not only was it heavily lopsided, but I had accidentally removed a chunk from the side. It wouldn't be able to contain anything. Daichi just chuckled and had me toss it.

"This one," he said after a couple hours, "is actually usable." He held up the piece I'd just finished carving out. Although it was a little misshapen, he was right; it was airtight, and it would be able to open and close properly.

"So, what should we do with it?" I asked.

He tossed it to me. "Keep it. I've still got my first pokeball somewhere."

Once I'd produced a success (a mild success, anyway), things went more smoothly. By the end of the day, almost a quarter of what I made was being kept to add to the discount bin.

"That's closing time," he said, putting down his knife and standing up to stretch. "Good work, Leonard."

"Thanks."

"Tell you what, since we missed lunch," _Had we?_ I'd gotten into such a rhythm that I hadn't noticed, but now that he mentioned it, my stomach was starting to growl, "let's go out to eat."

"Ah, sure, thank you," I said. "Where did you have in mind? I haven't really looked around town much..."

"Benny's Steakhouse," he said. "It's right near the Gym. That all right with you?"

I didn't have any problems with a steakhouse, so I agreed, and we set off.

"So, Leonard, are you much of a collector?"

"Not particularly," I said.

Daichi nodded at the man standing by the front door as we entered. "You don't want to have things just because they're different, then?"

I hmmed while I thought about it. If he had only asked once, I'd have hardly noticed, but since he was repeating himself, it probably mattered somehow.

"No," I said in the end. "Some things can be both different and good, and I'd want them because they're good. But, being different alone doesn't make it good, I don't think."

Daichi nodded, as a waiter arrived at our table. "All right, then."

"May I take your order?"

"Sure," Daichi said. "A number three for me, and the same for him. Oh, and one more thing." He leaned forward and whispered into the waiter's ear.

"Um," the waiter said, "why-"

He whispered again, more insistently, and this time the waiter nodded. "Understood. I'll be back in just a few minutes with your order."

The waiter left, and Daichi turned to look at me. "It's fine that I ordered for both of us, right?"

I shrugged. "You probably know the food better, so I guess it's fine. I'd like to get a look at the menu next time, though."

"Sure," he agreed.

A commotion rose a few tables over, and Daichi and I turned to take a look. A small bird was wandering by, carrying a leek stalk, and the customers there seemed to be excited about it.

"What's going on over there?" I asked.

"The Farfetch'd is a mascot here," he replied. "When they were getting started, he helped them gather wood to turn into charcoal, so that they could run the stoves. It's a piece of Azalea history, these days."

We watched people interact with the Farfetch'd for a few minutes more, before our waiter returned, carrying two piping hot plates of meat.

"Here you are, your-ah!" Suddenly, he stumbled. Trying and failing to recover his balance, he hit the floor, bursts of steam roiling away from the dropped plates. I rushed over to his side, helping him up.

"Are you all right? Are you burned anywhere?" I asked him, looking him over.

"Yes, I'm quite all right. I'm terribly sorry about the food-"

"No, no worries. We're certainly in no hurry. Go check yourself over, make sure you're all set."

"Ah, that's...I...thank you." He nodded to me, and headed back to the kitchens.

Daichi had an odd look in his eyes as I sat back down, and after studying me for a moment, he spoke. "Well, I suppose that's it."

"I'm sorry?"

He shook his head. "No, it's nothing."

The rest of dinner was relatively uneventful. After a short while, replacement plates were delivered, and I got my first try of the local fast food. It was astonishingly good: sort of a taste like hamburger, but tangier. I cleared my plate in record time, and Daichi finished shortly after. Daichi paid for the check ("only natural, since I had you skip your lunch break," he said) and left a large tip as well.

"All right," I said, once we'd left and were standing outside. "I'll be off then, unless there's anything left to do at the store?"

"That's all," he said. "But...are you busy tomorrow?"

"Not that I can think of," I said. "Why do you ask?"

He sighed. "Feel free to come in tomorrow. If I'm going to give you my Oddish, I'd best start getting the two of you acquainted." With that, he turned and began to walk away.

After a moment of surprise, I nodded at his back, then headed for Tom's house. Somehow, he'd decided tonight that I'd be trustworthy enough. A snap decision, after seeing me help the waiter? No, he seemed like the sort of person who planned things out carefully, rather than jump to conclusions...Well, it didn't matter. However it had happened, I'd been deemed worthy, and the feeling left me aglow.

Unlike the night before, my sleep that night was perfectly content.


	9. Hello, Oddish!

The next day, I rushed over to Daichi's shop first thing in the morning.

"Good morning, Daichi," I said as I entered. He nodded to me from behind the counter.

"Hello, Leonard. One moment, if you would." He kneeled below the counter, and a moment later resurfaced with a Back in Five Minutes sign. "I'll just hang this up for now."

"Why are you open today, by the by?" I asked.

"Given recent events," he said, "people might be looking to stock up and prepare themselves. Naturally, I have every reason to oblige them. That said," he paused as he hung up the sign, "people probably won't be here until noon at the least, so we have plenty of time. Come on, into the back."

In the other room, I sat and waited while he went to get the Oddish. As excited as I'd been, I hadn't really prepared myself. What were you supposed to do, when you first met a pokemon you intended to care for? In the wild you obviously introduced yourself through combat, I'd managed to pick up on that much at least. _I shouldn't attack the Oddish, right? That seems ridiculous._ What, then? Well, Tom's Graveler and Slowpoke had been easy enough to get along with, just by treating them more or less like pets. Vespiquen had seemed more like a person than anything. _All right, I'll act like I'm meeting a human, and then adjust based on how much they seem to understand-_

My train of thought cut off as the door cracked open, and a green, leafy head poked around its base, meeting my eyes.

"Ah," I said, all plans having momentarily fled from my brain. "Um, hello. Hello! I'm Leonard, and it's nice to meet you. You've been living with Daichi so far, I've heard?"

"Oddish can't usually speak, I'm afraid," Daichi said from behind the door, amusement belying his words. "The conversation's doomed to be one sided. Here, catch."

His hand appeared in the crack of the door, tossing through a small cookie. His aim was a bit off, but I leaned to the side and caught it. "That's a poffin; they're kind of a snack food. You don't want to always feed your pokemon them, but they're good for getting started on the right foot."

"All right, then." I held out the poffin, arm outstretched. "Would you like a poffin, Oddish?"

There was some clear hesitation, but after a moment, the Oddish moved out of the doorframe and started to walk toward me. Daichi moved to fill the empty space in the door frame. For my part, I tried to keep still and hold a smile on my face. Once he (she?) reached me, (s)he stopped for a moment, hesitating.

"By the way," I said, keeping my voice even, "is this a girl or a boy Oddish?"

"I'm not sure, actually. It's hard to tell before they evolve. If you decide to name them something, pick a name that works either way."

Their deliberation complete, the Oddish quickly rushed forward, snatching up the poffin from my hand. Careful not to let my excitement show, I replied, "All right. So, what's next?"

"Let it finish eating for now, and when it's done, see if it'll let you pet its leaves. If so, you're officially in its good books."

We watched in silence for a bit, as they munched away at the poffin, before Daichi spoke again. "Surely you've noticed something unusual about this Oddish?"

After thinking on it, I shook my head. "Not aside from it being green instead of blue, no."

He sighed. "That is what I meant."

"Oh. So, does that change what its types are? Like, is it just Grass instead of Grass and Poison, or...?"

"No, it's purely a cosmetic trait. Any pokemon can very rarely be..." He shook his head. "It really doesn't matter to you, does it?"

I shook my head. "As I said, I don't care about things being different for the sake of being different." The instant I said it, I understood. "Oh! So that's why you asked me that, on our way to the restaurant yesterday?"

He nodded. "If I just gave this Oddish to whoever asked, it would have turned into nothing more than something to show off. That's not what I wanted."

The Oddish finished off the last of the poffin from my hand. Slowly, I reached the same hand out toward them, watching for their reaction. I needn't have worried-once they noticed what I was doing, they ducked their head, rubbing it against my palm. The smile that spread across my face was wide enough to be painful.

* * *

Two or three hours later, I was sitting on the floor opposite my Oddish, playing catch. I would toss over a berry, and Oddish would catch it with their leaves (which, I had been surprised to learn, were prehensile). Depending on whether they wanted the berry, they would either eat it, or toss it back to me. It was a simple game, almost mind-numbingly so, but I couldn't be happier. Daichi glanced over from time to time, making sure things were going well, then returned his attention to his work. Occasionally, trainers wandered into the shop; it seemed that he'd been right about people wanting to stock up. At one point, Tom stopped by, but apart from giving me a quick thumbs-up, he'd done his shopping quickly, and left shortly thereafter.

The next person to stop by, to my surprise, was Bugsy, who had brought Maizie with him. (It was a strange contrast-despite seeming to be not much older than Maizie, the difference in maturity was plain as day. Part of me wondered why Bugsy was such an important figure at such a young age, but there didn't seem to be a good way to ask.)

"Good afternoon, Daichi, Leonard," he said.

"Good afternoon." "Hi, Bugsy."

"Hi, Len!" Maizie shouted.

"Hi, Maizie."

"Is that your Oddish?" Bugsy asked me.

I grinned. "You bet. Met them today, courtesy of Daichi, and we're getting along famously."

"Hmm." He grabbed half a dozen pokeballs from the high-quality rack, placing them on the counter. As Daichi rang them up, he said, "I'd intended to be on patrol at the western border, but...it's always valuable to have another prepared trainer. How would you feel about a quick spar? It would give you a good grasp of their capabilities, as well as some practice leading them."

"Yeah!" Maizie said. "That'd be awesome!"

 _So soon? Was that really a good idea?_ I opened my mouth, fully prepared to decline...but realized that Oddish had perked up, and was eyeing Bugsy intently.

"Well, all right," I said. "Since even Oddish agrees with you, let's have ourselves a fight."


	10. Low Level Combat

"The match will consist of a one on one battle. No substitutions are allowed. The match will end when one side concedes."

Daichi, acting as the referee, quickly went over the rules while Bugsy and I set ourselves on opposite sides of the "arena" (the backyard behind the shop). Since there wasn't a good spectating spot, Maizie reluctantly stayed inside with Vespiquen to watch from the window.

"When one side concedes?" I asked. "I'd heard you normally carried on until your pokemon couldn't fight anymore?"

"Normally, that's how it works, yes," Bugsy said. "Right now, though, the machine we use to heal pokemon is broken. We've been passing out potions to make up for it, but the more severe cases are all being handled by a single Chansey, who's run ragged already. Because of that, we won't really be pushing the limits here."

I nodded, vaguely remembering the nurse I'd met when I first arrived. "Got it."

"All right, are you ready?" Daichi asked. Bugsy agreed, and after making sure Oddish was prepared, so did I. "Begin!"

Bugsy held out a pokeball, and a moment later Oddish was facing a Metapod.

"Okay, Oddish, use..." Actually, I had no idea what Oddish knew how to do. "Use some kind of attack, and we'll see how it goes."

It wasn't much of an order, but Oddish went right to it: a thin stream of green wisps were pulled from the Metapod and sucked in by Oddish.

"That's called Absorb, by the way," Bugsy said. "Metapod, tackle!"

How Metapod could even move was unclear, being shaped like it was, but somehow it managed it, rushing forward and slamming into Oddish, who fell backward with a squeak.

I frowned. _Metapod seems fine, but Oddish is already looking a bit dazed after one hit. Absorb isn't strong enough to win with._ "If you have another attack, Oddish, use that!"

Clambering back to their feet, Oddish nodded. It puffed itself up, then spat a gob of purple spit that struck the Metapod across its torso. The difference between this and Absorb was obvious-smoke rose off where it had hit, and the Metapod quickly scrambled away looking worse for wear.

"That would be Acid," Bugsy commented. "Fairly effective. Metapod, Bug Bite!"

Metapod spun on a dime, its retreat turning into a dash toward Oddish.

"Oddish, dodge!" I said-entirely too late, as Metapod had already latched onto Oddish's leaves with its teeth, shaking them around like a dog might. A moment later, it let go, and Oddish fell to the ground, looking decidedly woozy.

This was bad. Metapod was weakened, after that last attack, but Oddish was too far gone already. Another hit, and I'd have to concede. There was no way Oddish would be able to dodge a hit, either-the Metapod was too fast. How, then...?

Just as it looked like Bugsy was about to give his next order, I spoke. "Oddish, spray Acid on the ground in front of you!"

Staggering to their feet, they complied, producing a thick puddle between them and Metapod, which began to emanate smoke.

Bugsy aborted whatever he had intended to say before, instead saying, "Metapod, circle around!"

Metapod darted along the side of the puddle, looking to reach Oddish without touching the acid. Pleased that my guess had turned out right, I said, "Keep spraying Acid between you and Metapod, Oddish!"

Despite how quickly the Metapod could run, Oddish kept up easily, spewing purple blobs to block its path. No matter how it tried, it couldn't find a way through, and shortly thereafter, a moat of acid surrounded Oddish, completely separating them from the Metapod.

"Well played," Bugsy said, shaking his head. "Metapod can't attack at range, short of using Electro Web, which I haven't taught it; nor can it cross the divide without getting too injured and forcing me to concede. Meanwhile, your Oddish can attack at a distance easily, such that it will eventually win. The match is yours. Good job, Leonard."

"Match over. Leonard wins by concession!" Daichi said, rather unnecessarily. "All right, now that I'm done pretending to be a referee, I'm going to head back in and man the counter, all right?"

"Yes, that's fine," Bugsy said. "Thank you, Daichi."

"Well done, Oddish!" I said. "Come over here-ah." I hadn't realized it, but Oddish was actually trapped by the moat. Thankfully, it was an easy fix. I just pulled them into my pokeball, then released them next to me.

"So, how do I clean that up?" I asked, gesturing to the moat.

Bugsy passed me a potion, then sprayed another across his Metapod. "Don't worry about it, it will evaporate in a few hours. By the way, how did you think of that strategy?"

"Well, I thought I needed to keep your Metapod away, and while I was thinking about how to do that, I remembered us getting trapped in Ilex by those walls of powder. So, I decided to try something similar." I rubbed Oddish's head as I sprayed them down, then passed them a poffin, which they happily grabbed in their mouth.

"Ah, I see. You know, Oddish actually evolves into Vileplume, so you could have done the exact same strategy."

"Do they really?" I looked down at Oddish. _You're going to be very smelly when you grow, aren't you...? Well, I'll worry about that when I get to it._ "For now, I think I've decided on a name: Max. It'll be Maxwell if you turn out to be a boy, or Maxine if you're a girl."

Bugsy grinned. "Naming your pokemon? Good. Not all trainers do, but I think it's a good choice."

"Um," I said, "Not to be rude, but it seems like you haven't...?"

"Unfortunately, most of the pokemon I care for are passed to me by trainers who don't want to care for them anymore. By that point, it's too late to change what they're called by."

"Oh." That was sadder than I'd expected his answer to be. "Sorry, I didn't know."

"Well, it's not your fault. Just take good care of Max, all right?"

I nodded, resolute.

"Glad to hear it. Now unless I'm mistaken, you're not actually on the clock. Want to see if Daichi minds me bringing you along on patrol?"


	11. Interlude I: Kurt

It had been almost three years ago that Kurt had met her.

The celebrations that night had been intense, as the news was made official: Team Rocket was gone. Their continued assault in Kanto had suddenly ceased, and with it any threat to Johto. Each town and city they'd controlled had been retaken, absent all opposition. Each member, from their leader Archer, to the rank and file seemed to have vanished. Later on, this unexplained disappearance would fuel all manner of conspiracy theories. For the time being, though, Kurt had been happy to join in drunken revelry with his friend Trenton.

Once the festivities began to die down, they'd stumbled toward their homes, still giddy with relief. By that time, it was well past midnight, so it was no surprise that the path was dark, and subsequently that they didn't see the person blocking the way.

"This isn't over," she had said.

She wore a long cloak, colored black; even once you knew she was there, you could barely see her in the darkness. A hood shrouded her face, as well. Were it not for the timbre of her voice, she'd have had no distinguishing features.

Kurt had jumped backward with surprise, and Trenton had almost fallen without Kurt's shoulder to lean on.

"Woah, miss," Kurt had chuckled shakily, "didn't see you there!"

"This isn't over," she repeated, ignoring him. "Team Rocket isn't gone."

Trenton's face had darkened, then, and he'd stepped forward. "Oy, what're you on about? That's an awful thing to say on a day like this, innit?"

"How is Maizie doing, Kurt?"

Kurt felt the blood drain from his face at her words. It hadn't been that long since he'd gotten her out of his son-in-law's hands, and she was already seeing improvement. The fact that this woman knew about that, though...

"Is that a threat?"

She shook her head. "Not a threat. Kids can be very rambunctious, though, and sometimes aren't as careful as they should be. I suggest you brush up on your first aid."

"That's enough!" Trenton pulled out a Pokeball, quickly releasing the Butterfree contained within. "Rafael, use sleep...powder..." he trailed off. "Where...?"

At some point, the woman had vanished, one shade of black giving way to another.

"Man, some people," Trenton said. "I'll report that later. You wanna pick up Maizie from the babysitter, crash at my place for a few days in case your stalker shows up?"

In the following days, not sure what to make of the woman, Kurt had brushed up on his medical skills, just in case. A week later, Maizie had choked on a slice of cake at her birthday party. Kurt had intervened immediately, and there was no harm done; but the only other person there with first aid training had been somewhere outside at the time, and he shuddered to think how long it might have taken to get help.

* * *

"I'd like two Dive Balls, and four Net Balls, please."

Briefly shaken from his memories, Kurt quickly rang up the customer's order, and waited for them to leave before he lapsed back into rumination.

* * *

His second meeting with the woman was two years ago, the day after Trenton's funeral.

He'd been a little reckless, Kurt suspected, ever since he'd lost his wife. He never did anything outright suicidal, probably for the sake of his son, but he'd always been pushing the envelope, taking any risk he could justify. It had finally caught up to him, somehow. He'd gone alone to investigate some event on route 33, and returned like...that.

It had been one of the most painful acts of his life to identify the body. Despite the mangling, there had been no doubt it was Trenton.

The funeral had been a strange, impersonal affair. As he'd been the gym leader, there were no shortage of attendees, but so few of them really knew the man. Somber faces and dry eyes filled the crowd. He himself had cried during the eulogy, as had Trenton's son, Bugsy. (Arceus, how he'd teased him for giving his kid that name. "Passing off your own interests," he'd said. It had proved apt, though.) Maizie had, too, though more out of sympathy than anything. If anyone else had wept, Kurt hadn't noticed.

When he'd returned to his home, the cloaked woman had been standing outside the front doorstep. He'd quickly hidden Maizie behind him, then spoke.

"You." Anger filled his words. "Give me one good reason not to get the cops."

She'd nodded once, then said, "They intend to make Bugsy the new gym leader."

His anger diminished, and shock filled the gap it left behind. "What?"

"His skill with Bug-type pokemon is prodigal. That is what they will say, to justify the move."

"But why? He's not...he's a child! There's no way he could take on that kind of responsibility."

"Who knows? I suspect the police chief intends him to be a puppet, someone easily manipulated."

That made far too much sense to Kurt, and indignation added itself to the emotions swirling in his gut. "You've come to warn me, then, both now and before? All right, I'll find a way to stop this. My word should have some weight around here, after my work on Slowpoke Well."

"No!" The woman said, panic lacing her voice. "That's what needs to be stopped!"

Confusion attempted to add itself to the mix, only to discover that Kurt had no vacancies left to feel anything more. "What does that mean?" He asked, wearily.

"Bugsy's strong," she said. "Stronger than he should have had to be. If he ends up the gym leader, he'll do the position justice, and any manipulation will fall flat against him."

"That's no excuse to force him into the job."

She winced. "I know. It's not. But...you're not enough. They'll force him to take the job anyway, and your points about him being too young will just make him look weaker. It will only cost him respect."

Kurt frowned, turning it over in his head. Much as he hated to admit it... "If you're right about this, and the police chief is involved, then I probably can't stop them. I'll go along with it, if it plays out that way."

"That's all I ask."

"With that taken care of, who exactly are..."

Before he could finish his sentence, the woman dissolved, color fading away. Within seconds, he faced an empty doorstep.

Rather than go inside, he chose to rent a room at an inn for a few days, for Maizie's peace of mind if nothing else; and when Officer Jenny announced Bugsy's succession to the position of gym leader, he kept quiet.

* * *

"Now, Maizie, I bet Leonard's pretty tired. Why don't you hop down?"

"Nope! He promised I could have a piggy back ride the whooole way over."

Once again, Kurt was roused from his thoughts, this time hearing Bugsy and Maizie standing outside.

"This is the whole way over, Maizie," Bugsy said.

"Nuh-uh! We're going on patrol to catch bad guys!"

"Well, it's true that Leonard and I are going on patrol. And, if we see any bad guys, I promise we'll catch them. But your grandpa doesn't want you anywhere dangerous, and neither do I."

"That's not fair!"

"Maybe not," Bugsy said. "You know, though, I bet your grandpa misses you."

"No he doesn't! You're just distracting me!"

"I'm not! I bet he's all sad in there, because his favorite granddaughter in the whole wide world doesn't even want to help him in the shop."

"That's not...he's not, right?"

Kurt grinned. Once Bugsy started this trick, it worked every time. Maizie was a predictable little kid.

"Even worse, I bet your slowpoke, Donald, misses you too! I bet he's curled up next to your grandpa, and he's _so sad_ he might _die_."

"What? But I don't want him to die!"

"Then hurry and cuddle him! Go, go, go!"

Her footsteps rushed toward the house, and a moment later the door slammed open.

"Grandpa, don't be sad!"

 _Well,_ Kurt thought, _time to play along_. He scooped her into his arms as she ran to him. "Maizie! I'm so glad you're here! It was so lonely, with only Donald in the house with me!"

She giggled as he twirled her about. "Oh, but," he said, putting her down again, "I think Donald needs you to check on him too. Go make sure he's doing okay, all right?"

"Okay, grandpa!"

Once she'd headed to her bedroom, he settled into his seat at the counter and thought.

* * *

"Today is the day," the cloaked woman said.

Kurt glanced over his shoulder, where Maizie was by the front door in the other room. "What do you mean?" he whispered.

"Do you remember the first warning I gave you?"

He thought for a moment. "You mean, Team Rocket...?" As he spoke, a pit formed in his stomach, and he fervently hoped she denied the claim.

She nodded. "Today's the day your proof arrives. Feel free to investigate. Get as much information as you need to be certain. Once you have? Do not wait, do not dally over whether you're absolutely certain or not. Act immediately."

Kurt nodded. "Understood." He still knew little about this woman, but with how things had played out, he felt it likely she had their best interests at heart.

With nothing else to say, the woman vanished, fading into daylight.

A moment later, somebody knocked on the door. "Grandpa! Come quick!" Maizie shouted.

 _So soon?_ Steeling his nerves, Kurt strode to the front door and swung it open. On the other side stood that boy he'd seen a few days ago, who worked for Daichi, carrying an unconscious Bugsy. As well, Bugsy's Vespiquen stood tall, clearly injured, keeping watch over somebody wearing a heavy black uniform.

He recognized the uniform immediately.


	12. Strife and Banter

"All right," I muttered, rubbing my back. "That's that, then?" We'd brought Maizie back to Kurt's house, and after some convincing from Bugsy, gotten her to run inside. That was for the best; there was no way she could come along to keep an eye out for Team Rocket. Not to mention...

"Are you sure you don't need a break?" Bugsy asked, grinning. "I wouldn't begrudge you a couple minutes to recuperate."

"Bah." I waved my arm dismissively. "If I could carry you here from the forest at a dead run, a hyperactive Maizie's no trouble." _That said, if she had come along, I would have had to pass her off to Vespiquen._

"Suit yourself. Now, unless there's any other stops we need to make?" He paused for a moment, and after Vespiquen and I failed to respond, he continued, "Good. Off we go, then."

"So, how's this going to work?" I asked, as we began to walk. "I watch one way, you watch the other, we shout if we see anything fishy?"

Bugsy snorted. "No, we have a more, uh, _involved_ system. I'll assign you to one of the groups we've got, and you'll stay with them. If your group sees anything suspicious, you'll have a walky-talky to call it in. Depending on how suspicious it is, nearby groups will come join you as backup. Similarly, if anybody else calls it in, your group rotates over to join them."

I nodded. "Okay, makes sense. So, which group do you plan to stick me in?"

He frowned. "I'm not sure, actually. What do you think, Vespiquen?"

Vespiquen buzzed to herself, then said, "With Michael, perhaps?"

"Oh, Mike's group!" Bugsy exclaimed. "Yeah, that'd work perfectly. He's a member at my Gym, good head on his shoulders. You'll get along fine, I bet."

"Fine by me," I said. "How about you? Where should I expect you to be?"

"I'll be in the middle group," Bugsy replied. "Easiest place to reach the other groups if they need it. Relatedly, would you mind much if Vespiquen came with you?"

Vespiquen gave a start in surprise. "What? No, thank you."

"...Um. Vespiquen, you agreed to the plan before."

"I thought you were joking!"

"Why would I be joking? The whole point of the meeting was to decide our course of action, and that's what was decided on."

"It doesn't make any sense, though! I don't need to be anywhere else."

"Vespiquen, we discussed the advantages of this. Were you not listening?"

"Well," she fidgeted, "I heard those, but I thought you meant Pinsir, and, and Yanmega, maybe!"

"They'll be going to other groups, too, if that helps. You're not the only one I'm sending somewhere else." Bugsy was starting to look concerned.

"No," Vespiquen shook her head frantically, "that's not...I don't care if they're going to be in other groups, but, but you can't just get rid of me!"

"Woah, hey, I'm not getting rid of you! You'd come back after, it'd just be during the patrol, okay?"

"That's not, that doesn't _mean_ anything, 'just during the patrol', what if you need me for, for something, and I'm not there?"

Bugsy sighed. "Vespiquen..." Turning to me, he said, "Sorry, Leonard, mind if we take a minute to hash this out?"

Having gotten progressively more uncomfortable with the situation as it progressed, I quickly nodded and power-walked away.

* * *

A few minutes later, they found me leaning against the wall of the alley I ducked into, Max running around my feet and looking about curiously. Vespiquen's face was hard to read, given the difference in shape, but the panic seemed to be gone, replaced with...embarassment, maybe? She was a little red in the face, at any rate. Bugsy just looked relieved.

"Hey," I said. "Everything good?"

"Yeah, we're all set," Bugsy said.

Vespiquen bowed to me. "It would be my honor to join your group for the day, if you are willing. I apologize for previously impugning you."

I waved off the apology. "No worries, I knew you weren't mad at me."

With that settled, I scooped up Max and we began again to head toward the patrol area.

"So," I said, "While I was hanging out, and thinking about this patrol scheme you've cooked up, I couldn't help but notice a minor flaw."

"Oh?" Bugsy responded. "And what's that?"

"Supposing you wanted to sneak into town, one way to do it would be to set up a distraction for one group. That group would call in the nearby groups, which would leave those groups' spots empty, and then you just walk through the empty areas to reach the town without a fuss."

He frowned. "Yes, that's definitely true. We're banking on it taking them a while to figure out that weakness, assuming they're even trying to get into Azalea in the first place. If they're not, then all we've lost is some time standing around. If they are, though, we just need to keep them from doing it until our request reaches the... _Elite Four_."

That last bit was said with more than a touch of flair, and he looked at me with an expectant grin. When I failed to respond, he slumped. "Not impressed, huh? Mr. Bigshot, over here, probably has coffee with them every Tuesday."

"Sorry," I said, "It's just that I don't know who those are."

"You don't know who the Elite Four are? How is that even...wait, Tom told me about this, I think. Your parents thought that all trainers were evil and possessed by Giratina?"

That was not at all what I'd told Tom, nor did I know what Giratina was. Instead of saying that, though, I shrugged and said, "More or less, yeah."

"Hm. Well, the Elite Four is this group of the best five trainers in the region-"

"Sorry, five?"

He mock glared at me. "Okay, rephrasing. There's the Champion, who's the strongest trainer in the region, then there's the Elite Four, who are the next four strongest trainers in the region. One plus four is five. You got it?"

"Sure, sure," I replied airily. "I just needed to know who I was having coffee with, is all."

Shaking his head, he continued, "The Elite Four and the Champion usually travel around the region, preventing disasters and rendering aid wherever it's needed. When neither is necessary, they occasionally accept challengers who have every regional badge, which I theorize is to stimulate the competitive battling scene in order to-"

"Bugsy," Vespiquen interrupted warmly. "If he didn't know about the Elite Four, he certainly won't follow that."

"Right, sorry. The point is, they get things done. The only time any Elite Four has had trouble was Kanto's, back when the original Team Rocket was at its peak. When it comes to this splinter group we're looking at, we just have to hold out until our request goes through, and the problem's as good as solved."

A pleasant sort of silence fell after that, and a few minutes later we arrived.

There were a _lot_ of trainers gathered at the edge of town, somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 or 50. Most of them were sitting on the grass just past the last houses, chatting among themselves or playing with their pokemon. Nearby, I recognized the first Apricorn tree I'd ever tried to pick from. _Come to think of it, Kurt probably wouldn't mind me picking from it anymore._

"Good afternoon, and thank you all for coming." Bugsy said. Unlike his usual speech, here he was projecting his voice, and it rang loud and clear across the area. It was impressive (although the high-pitched voice detracted from it, somewhat. Well, he couldn't be older than 12, so there was no avoiding it.)

"Some of you I've spoken with already about how this is going to go, but for everyone else, I'm going to quickly go over the details, and then we'll get started."


	13. Empty Radar

"This is Group B. No sightings yet, but our snack supplies are dwindling rapidly. If we miss the next sound off, assume we've been taken by famine. Over."

After Bugsy had outlined the plan, many trainers had left again to make preparations for their shifts on lookout. The remainder of us had split into five groups of five and spread evenly across the Azalea-Ilex border, with Group A farthest south and Group E farthest north. Bugsy was in the center with Group C. Vespiquen and I were in Group B with Mike, Yuu and Sandra.

At first, we'd been fully alert, eyes scanning the horizon, having our pokemon pay attention as well. We'd quickly realized, though, that we couldn't sustain that level of focus. Instead, we sat in a semicircle facing the forest, our pokemon lounging with us, and kept our eyes toward it while we talked and ate.

"You'll survive a couple hours without food," a woman's voice crackled from the radio, exasperated.

Mike laughed. "Aw, you're cruel, Lucy. By the way, you forgot to say 'over'. Over."

She sighed, the sound coming across as mostly static, then continued. "This is Group A. Nothing unusual happening in the forest, but Scott left. He was mad at us over something, but nobody could figure out what, and he wasn't sharing. Over."

"Noted." Bugsy's voice, this time. "I'll send Tom over to you, and check in with Scott when I can. Out."

With that, the radio fell silent, as it would be for the next hour unless something important came up.

Mike shook his head. "Now that that's done, what were we talking about? Yuu, you were telling a story, right?"

Yuu nodded rapidly, his braided hair bouncing as he did. "I was. It was, ahh..." He frowned.

"Something about a Gym you went to, right?" Mike prompted.

Yuu's eyes lit up. "Yes! This was Ecruteak Gym. Now, Gym Leaders can set up their challenges however they want, yes? So it is not very surprising, when they have some special gauntlet to go through. In this case, the first thing I noticed when I walked in was that it was very dark. You couldn't see anything at all, except these patches of light. Each one had a trainer standing in the light, so obviously I said to myself that I just had to walk from one spot to the next, and win each fight on the way. But, I stepped forward, and you know what happened?"

"What?" Sandra asked.

"I fell straight through the floor," he said, excitement thickening his accent. "and next thing I knew, I was back at the entrance!"

"Wow," Mike said. "How'd that happen?"

"I get to that part, yes? I am being very careful as I walk back in. I felt it out with my feet, and I could find the holes in the ground where I fell before. So I have to go very slowly, checking with my feet first, all the way to the beam of light. It was scary, much scarier than a haunting house, because I didn't understand what happened when I fell. Finally, I reach the beam of light, and I relax, because I know what to do, and I win against the trainer standing there. But, after I win," he grinned, "the light goes out, and I fall through the floor, and I am having to start again!"

Mike laughed uproariously at that, pounding the grass with his fist. It wasn't really that funny, but it somehow got funnier the more he laughed at it, and in a moment the rest of us were laughing too. Max almost fell off my shoulder, but I kept just enough of my composure to hold them up.

"I had to go through there three more times," Yuu said, once the laughter died down, "and each time there was something to catch me off guard, you see? In the end, the gym leader asked if I had any requests, once I'd earned the badge, and I asked how I kept ending up outside the Gym."

"Because people can't teleport on their own, right?" Sandra asked.

"Yes," Yuu replied. "I thought maybe the darkness and the teleporting was some special move, that he'd taught one of his pokemon. It turned out he just borrowed an Abra to follow me around and teleport me if I fell down."

"That'd do it," Mike said, idly opening a juice container and taking a sip. A moment later, he recoiled. "Blech! Anybody want this? It's Mago."

"Sure, I'll take it," I said. I'd developed a taste for Mago berries-they were very sweet, and the curly shape reminded me of a Cheeto, not that anyone except me knew what that meant around here.

He passed it over and grabbed another container for himself. Sandra grabbed one as well, and we sat in silence for a bit while we drank.

"You know," Sandra said, "this is too easy. I don't like it."

"Your Ranger instincts kicking in?" I asked, only half joking.

"...Maybe," she replied, her expression dropping. "Might just be superstition, but the last time I spent so long on the job doing nothing, it ended with Entei barreling into Olivine City."

Mike's jaw dropped. "Holy _shit_. Seriously?"

Yuu didn't say anything, but his eyes had widened noticeably. Based on his and Mike's reaction, I decided to act just as surprised.

"Yeah," she said. "Slagged the outer walls and made it in before word even reached us. I only saw glimpses of it, as it ran from street to street. Spent most of my time doing evac."

"I heard of that, on the news." Vespiquen bowed slightly. "A tragedy. You have my condolences."

Sandra sighed. "Yeah, it...all the houses there are made of steel, which is supposed to be fire resistant, you know? But they just...melted, if they got hit. And the gym leader, she tried to hold Entei off, but...It's one of the Legendary Beasts, right? Plus, she specializes in steel types. If it wasn't for Elite Will showing up, we would've just been wasting our time."

"You saved people, yes?" Yuu asked. "Not a waste, then."

"...Yeah. My brother said that, too. I said he was too charitable. He got hit, you know? Him and his group were alternating Protect shields, just in case. Rest of his group weren't paying attention, didn't put up their shield in time. A stray Fire Blast came through. He lived, cause he was on the edges of it. Most of them didn't. I visited him in the hospital, after he was patched up enough to have visitors. He said that, that it was _worth it_ , because he'd made it so not everyone was dead, and I asked him how he could feel that way, when they couldn't even bother to keep their own miserable skins safe-"

She stopped, and took a deep breath, shuddering. Mike and I exchanged uneasy glances. I wasn't sure what he was thinking, but this was way too heavy for me to have a good response.

"-anyway," she continued, planting a brittle smile on her face. "All I meant to say was, this feels a little like the calm before the storm. So, let's keep an eye out, shall we?"

I nodded, trying to act positive. "We can do that! No problem." So saying, I stood up, looked to the left, looked to the right, and looked back toward the town for good measure. A moment later, I froze, a chill running down my spine.

Standing next to one of the houses, a black robed, hooded figure stared at us.

 _How- what- they're already in- what do I-_

"Leonard?" Mike asked, turning. "What's up? Oh. Ohhh geez."

A moment after Mike saw them, they dissolved, vanishing into thin air.

Mike scrambled for the radio. "This is Group B. We've got, uh, there was somebody in the town, wearing all black. Not the uniform, it was like a cloak, but they were staring us down, and they just vanished. Not like they walked away, they were just gone."

I still hadn't moved. Max was huddled against my shin. When had they gotten off of my shoulder? Mike was still talking into the radio. Sandra was striding toward where the person had been, her turtle following close behind. Her shuckle, rather. _Shouldn't I have done that?_ I should have. Maybe I could have caught them. I could have-

A hand came to rest on my shoulder, and I tensed up. "You are all right?" Yuu asked.

Realizing who it was, I finally unfroze. "I'm not sure," I said. "I've been in worse situations that having someone stare at me, but..." _For some reason, it felt like they knew me._

Yuu nodded. "This I understand. It is like my story, yes? The fighting is easy, but when there is no way to fight, that is when a thing can scare you. Let's return to our spot, and wait for reinforcements. Bugsy will have a plan, and following that can be your fight."

It didn't sound like he entirely understood the source of my fear. Still, I nodded, a bit shakily, and Yuu led me back to the half-circle of abandoned snacks.


	14. Flipped Coin

In the end, there was nothing to be done about the cloaked stranger. There was no real way to follow them, given that they'd vanished. Bugsy distributed their description to the other groups, just in case, but otherwise the shift passed without further incident.

Once our shift had ended, I'd walked Vespiquen back to Bugsy's group. While I was there, I checked to see what his plans were for the rest of the day. 'Hours of paperwork' was an answer I deemed unacceptable. Instead, I offered to help him finish it later if he and Vespiquen took a break to watch a movie. He accepted, but neither of us knew what movies would be any good. Which led to our current situation.

"I know it was supposed to be a 'turn-your-brain-off' kind of movie, that's how they marketed it, but that's hard to do when so much of it is wrong! For example, when Mega Beedrill was chasing the main character..."

Bugsy, I was coming to realize, was a bit of a nerd.

He'd been going on like this for a couple minutes now. The breadth of his knowledge regarding pokemon was impressive, and he was using every bit of it to get frustrated over the campy action movie we'd just watched. I suspected he enjoyed finding flaws to object to.

"...and there aren't that many hours in a day! They obviously just pulled some numbers out of a hat!"

I nodded sagely, having not noticed anything he'd objected to while we watched. "So, how'd you feel about the movie?"

"Wha...How'd I _feel_ about it?" His face morphed from frustrated to contemplative. "Hmm. I mean, it wasn't terrible. The balloon race was fun to watch. And they didn't do any of that dumb 5-minute romance you usually see in these movies. Yeah, it was pretty decent."

I chuckled. "Glad to hear it. How about you, Vespiquen? What'd you think?"

Vespiquen started slightly. (That was something I'd started to notice-she was often quiet on her own, and tended to be surprised if someone other than Bugsy spoke to her.) "Oh, it...was very fast paced. The acrobatics were quite impressive for a human to manage."

"Us humans, eh? Well, that's fair. Quadruple backflip from a standing start, definitely don't ask me to do that."

Bugsy smiled. "What about you, Leonard? You sharing, or are you too shy to offer your opinion?"

"Ah, just balancing us out. After all," I nudged him, "you had more than enough opinion for all of us."

Without a good retort, he blew a raspberry at me.

"Oh, okay," I laughed, "since you put it that way, how can I refuse? I thought the music was nice. Really...brassy. Lots of trumpets."

"It was made in Hoenn," he replied. "That's the style over there."

I nodded. "Cool. Well, I think we're done here. Anything else you want to...do...?"

Halfway through my question, he'd straightened up in his chair, frowned slightly at something to the other side of me, and stood. Following his line of sight, I saw a man striding toward us. He wore a leather duster, a very large pair of boots, and a pokeball belt at his waist.

"Hello, Scott," Bugsy said.

Scott nodded. "Leader Bugsy. Who's this supposed to be?" The question was accompanied by a jerk of his head toward me.

"Leonard, this is Scott Beaucard, a member of my gym. Scott, this is Leonard, a new trainer."

"And why is he-"

"Actually," Bugsy continued, cutting off whatever protest Scott had been about to make, "I'm glad to see you here. Earlier today, you left your group without reporting in. Now is a fantastic time to explain what had you too busy to communicate."

Scott glared at me. "I believe that is a matter for members of the Gym only. He needs to lea-"

"Fair enough," Bugsy interrupted, "let's walk for a minute."

Although he looked like he was positively boiling, Scott followed him as he left the sitting area, occasionally glaring back at me.

"Is he always like that?" I asked Vespiquen.

"He has been difficult for Bugsy to deal with, sometimes, yes."

"I meant Bugsy, actually. Very stern, no-nonsense. It seems very unlike the version of him I know."

"Oh!" She thought for a moment. "Yes, he is usually this way when dealing with those under his leadership. It is necessary for him, I think, being so young. If he was not serious, he would not be taken seriously."

I frowned. "That sucks." _Good time to get an explanation for that, though._ "How did he end up being the gym leader, then?"

"I was not present at the time, but this is the story to my understanding. His father was a gym leader, and he showed great promise himself. After his parents died, the police chief-"

My jaw dropped. "What."

Vespiquen paused. "I'm sorry?"

" _What._ "

"That doesn't really explain."

"That, it," I was so flabbergasted it was taking me a moment to get my thoughts in order, "everything about that is terrible."

She frowned. "Yes, losing your parents is hard."

"That isn't the point! Well, it's kind of the point, but, forcing someone into a high-pressure job is _not what you do with orphans_!"

Her eyes narrowed. "Bugsy is more than capable-"

"I know he is, I've seen him handle people pretty well, but that doesn't matter! What kind of person does it take to say, 'oh, you're in the shittiest part of your life now, we'll make up for that with a 12-hour workday?'"

"..."

I sighed. "Sorry, returning to the story. It was the police chief's fault, you said?"

She nodded. "There were concerns about the town's safety. He said that, without a gym leader, there was no guarantee of the town's safety. Other trainers can pitch in, when disasters happen, but gym leaders have always made the most difference."

I slumped. "They should've picked someone else."

"Perhaps."

I glanced over to where Bugsy and Scott had walked. Scott looked even angrier than before, gesticulating wildly, while Bugsy remained calm and collected.

"What do you think they're talking about?" I asked.

"Scott is convinced that you're a spy for Team Rocket, claiming that a new trainer is too suspicious with this timing. Bugsy is asserting that you are not."

I looked at her with surprise. "You can hear them from here?"

"I can. Normally I try not to mention it. I know how frustrated humans can be by their inferior bodies."

Deadpan though it was, I caught the trace of humor attached to it this time. "Oh, okay. Yeah, you got me, I'm super jealous. One day I'm going to turn myself into a Vespiquen, and then I'll have the last laugh."

"A sound plan, to be sure, but I don't think Bill would let you."

I frowned. "Who's Bill?"

She didn't respond, her attention snapping over to them. Scott was leaving, and Bugsy was returning to the seating area.

"What's up?" I asked, once he'd slid back into his seat.

"He had _objections_ to your presence, in several ways," Bugsy responded wearily. "Some rambling argument about unequal treatment. Once I shut that down, he decided you must be a spy, and nothing I said convinced him otherwise."

I raised my eyebrows. "I'm a spy? That's news to me. But, at least there's a bright side: I'll be able to run away if you ever send a Mega Beedrill after me."

"Oh, don't even start," he said, a grin wiping away his stern expression. "Speaking of being a spy, though, I believe there's some very boring paperwork you offered to help me with...?"

I groaned. "Right, I forgot. Let's get it done, then."


	15. When It Rains

_Now that I've got some money saved up from working from Daichi, I've decided to start keeping a personal journal. Not everything I notice will be kept here, for obvious reasons, but it should help me keep my thoughts collected._

 _After complaints about not being able to train properly, Bugsy's put the lookout groups on a rotation. Every day, one group is allowed to practice with their pokemon at will (although he still recommends not letting them faint-that poor Chansey at the pokemon center is getting worked to the bone already). Today was Group B's turn, and Sandra helped me familiarize myself with Max's abilities and refine them. (Mike and Yuu chipped in as well, of course, but they were focused on their own pokemon). I've noted their abilities below._

 _Absorb (Grass-typed): Pulls a number of green wisps from its target, which Max uses to replenish their own vitality. Seems to be fairly weak, but Sandra says it can be improved for sizable increases in power._

 _Sweet Scent: A good-smelling...substance of some kind, which fills the air. Very pleasant, but also distracting._

 _Acid (Poison-typed): This is basically just a blob of poison spit. If it does anything else, I didn't notice. Strong, though; should probably use this instead of Absorb most of the time._

 _Acid Moat: Sandra helped me teach this one to Max, and also come up with the name. It's like what I did against Bugsy: they spew a continuous line of acid onto the ground, so that you can't reach them without walking through it._

 _Poison Powder: Exactly what it says it is. I accidentally stood in this the first time I had Max use it. Very unpleasant, and the potion I had to chug afterward was similarly terrible._

-Leonard's Journal

* * *

Of all the possible problems with an outdoors lookout, somehow inclement weather had never occurred to me as one of them.

I and the other members of Group B stood in the empty field, drenched by freezing rain. Vespiquen stood on the ground, wings too soaked to hover. I could hardly see everyone else; the water running down my face obscured my vision.

 _Hadn't it been sunny a few minutes ago?_ The thought was rhetorical-I knew the answer was yes, but frustration bid me ask it anyway.

"Th-this is Group B," Mike said, teeth chattering while he protected the radio from the rain with his body. "What are the other groups doing about the weather?"

"We've got an umbrella here, but it's not doing so well against the wind," someone replied.

"Same," someone else chimed in. "We set up a canopy, but it blew over already. Bugsy, what should we do?"

Sandra, shivering, huddled up next to me while we listened. Somehow, she was even colder than I was.

"At l-least the pokemon are enjoying themselves," I muttered to her. Max and Yuu's Croconaw, whose name slipped my mind, were happily chasing each other around through the torrential downpour. Rather than respond, Sandra just nodded, continuing to shiver.

"...We won't be able to do anything in conditions like this," Bugsy said at last. "All groups report in, then we'll head back to town and figure out something there."

We waited in silence for the first group to start the sound off.

"I said all groups report in. That means you first, Group A."

As cold as it was, it still managed to send a chill down my spine when there continued to be no response from the group.

"Sorry, Group B," Bugsy said. "I need you to check in with them instead of heading back. Let us know once you're there. Everyone else, report in."

"Shit." Mike awkwardly stowed the radio in his shirt as the other groups began to sound off. "They probably sh-shorted out their radio or something. Let's get this done fast, all right?"

"Certainly," Yuu said, seemingly unperturbed by the conditions.

"Be prepared, though," Mike said as we headed off. "Just in case something's up, we don't want t-to be off guard."

"Yeah," Sandra mumbled.

The march to Group A was made in silence, the only sounds coming from the falling rain and the splash of our feet as we trudged through the standing water. Most of us, I think, were too miserable about the conditions to talk. Yuu didn't seem to care much, but he was usually comfortable with a lack of conversation.

As we neared our destination, Vespiquen held out her arm to stop us. "Wait."

"Is there a problem?" Yuu asked.

"Maybe. I hear something."

We stood and listened for a moment. It was barely noticeable, but behind the rush of water, there was a faint buzzing noise. A moment later, the radio erupted into static.

"That can't be g-good," Mike said. "Let's get over there fast."

Now rushing to reach our destination, we continued forward. As we moved, the noise grew louder, and soon we were close enough to see through the thick curtains of rain. What we saw was a scene of utter destruction.

Deep grooves had been carved into the earth, some of which had already filled with water, some of which somehow burned despite the rain. Pillars of ice lay strewn across the ground, shattered. Unconscious Beedrill lay collapsed around the site, while still more swarmed to the center. In the center stood the members of Group A, hiding under a tower of dead vines that sprung from the earth.

Sandra cursed and ran forward, her shuckle appearing in her hands. I winced as the right side of my body was once again exposed to the cold.

"Euka, withdraw!"

Obediently, the shuckle drew its limbs inside of its shell. Still running, Sandra threw it forward in an underhand serve. The shuckle launched forward, water surging away from it as it skimmed across the ground, until it bumped into the vines and came to a stop.

"Now protect!" She shouted.

A glimmering white shield appeared between Group A and the oncoming beedrill. One beedrill bounced off the shield, its charge deflected. A volley of needles also were stopped, sticking into the shield's surface. A moment later, the shield vanished, and the needles fell.

That served as the starting gun, in a sense-once she'd started, the rest of us rushed to the fight. Mike released his pidgeotto, and with a series of whistles, had it begin to divebomb the remaining beedrill. Yuu had his croconaw surf forward, picking up the water around it and bringing it to bear. Vespiquen stood in place, firing glittering lasers into the crowd.

As for me, I was thinking maybe I wasn't quite prepared for this sort of battle.

 _Okay, what can I do?_ I asked myself, running forward. _Most of Max's abilities will be just as bad for us as they are for them. Actually, beedrill are probably immune to poison in the first place, so poison powder would be doubly bad. Acid would be difficult to land; they're flying around too fast._

That only left one move, unfortunately. I came to a stop on a twisted patch of ground that had been converted to steel and released Max. "Max, use Absorb on the nearest beedrill."

Max nodded, or shook its leaves, and began to drain. A thin line of green wisps began to flow from it to us. The beedrill aborted its dive towards the vines and spun to face us, seemingly no worse for wear.

 _Ah, crap._

Thankfully, the next moment it was bowled over by a burst of wind. Returning to ignoring us once again, it spun to face the pidgeotto responsible.

"Again," I said. "Same target."

This time, the beedrill was swinging its stingers at pidgeotto with reckless abandon when the absorb hit. Its attack slowed as its head turned in our direction, and that was enough for pidgeotto to counter, tackling the beedrill in a sudden blur of speed.

"One more."

The beedrill had nearly recovered, attempting to fend off pidgeotto, when the absorb struck again. Its attention wavered, and this time pidgeotto landed on top of it, using its wings to dive. A moment later, the beedrill was slammed into the ground and didn't get up again.

"Good job, Max!" I said. "You did a great job of distracting them."

 _Now, how many were left?_ Not many, so far as I could tell; the air was almost empty now. Vespiquen continued to fire arcing beams with meticulous accuracy, each attack striking down a Beedrill in a single hit. Despite that, the remainder continued to dive at the vine shelter.

"All right, Max," I said, moving forward to get in range. "When I say so, use absorb on whichever beedrill is diving at the time." It seemed like, although it didn't actually hurt them much, it served as a good way to divert their attention.

As I walked, I kept an eye on Sandra's shield, which had been vanishing and reappearing as it expired and was reactivated. The moment it fell, I spoke. "Now!"

The absorb struck. A diving beedrill, looking to get through the gap in her defense, abruptly switched directions and sped toward us, not losing any speed for the turn. I waited expectantly for the next attack to draw its attention away from us. A moment later, I realized everyone else was busy.

"Welp. Max, Acid!"

The purple blob of spit sailed harmlessly past the beedrill, as it maneuvered to the side. _Right, they're too fast for that._

"Uh, Sweet Scent!"

A pleasant aroma wafted up, and was immediately washed away by the rain. The beedrill was getting close. _I've got nothing that will work. My best bet is to try to dodge, then maybe make a break for Vespiquen while its turning around-_

"Trick room!" A woman's voice said from behind me. A blue box blossomed into existence around me and the beedrill, and the beedrill abruptly slowed to a walking speed.

The cloaked stranger I'd seen several days ago strode past me, a Slowking walking with her.

"Power Gem," she said. Slowking raised its arm, and fired a glittering beam, much the same as Vespiquen was doing. Slowed as it was, the beedrill didn't stand a chance-it took a direct hit, then fell.

"Um, thanks," I said. Did this mean they were on our side, or...?

The woman turned her head in my direction

 _concern relief frustration_

and vanished, her Slowking vanishing with her. A moment later, the blue box around me dissipated as well, leaving me baffled.

"Is everybody okay?" Mike asked.

The fight over, everyone had gathered under the remains of the vine shelter. Those of us who had arrived later on were taking the opportunity to dry themselves off, while Group A mostly stood around looking sheepish.

"We're all right," Lucy said. "We weren't prepared for that number of Beedrill, though; all of our pokemon are out of commission."

"I see," Mike replied. "By the way, how did the terrain get so irrevocably jacked up?"

"Well, you know," another person said-not somebody I knew, "we really had to go all out, right? We'd be a lot worse off otherwise."

"Is that all it was?"

"Yeah."

"...Fair enough," Mike said. "Very impressive, I'll admit, but I do wonder how we're going to repair it later."

"That's fine," Lucy responded. "We can worry about tomorrow tomorrow. How are the other groups doing? Our radio is busted."

"The groups headed back, actually. No point staring at a wall of water. Now that the situation's resolved, I suggest we do the same. First, though..."

Mike leaned over to me, a smirk on his face. "Leonard, I saw you and Sandra all cuddled up on the way over. Care to explain?"

I hadn't considered that embarrassing, at the time, but the way Mike asked made me turn red. "That's really not-"

"Don't care! Walk with me for a minute, let's have some guy talk."

Ignoring my protests, he grinned and pulled me outside into the rain. Once we rounded the corner, he immediately dropped the grin, his expression turning somber.

"Leonard, Bugsy trusts you, right?"

I nodded, confused. "Wait, so this isn't...?"

"Nah, I don't care about that." He jabbed an apricorn against my chest, and after a moment, I felt the familiar chill of my magic draining away.

"Explain, please?" I had no idea, at this point, what he was up to.

He sighed and pocketed his pokeball. "Ignore that, that was...just in case." He dropped his voice to a murmur, leaning in close. "Anyway, I need you to tell Bugsy something. I'm one of the subleaders at the gym, and as a consequence, I'm familiar with every member of Group A. Their habits, their pokemon, their abilities, I know all that. Which means I know for a fact that every one of them lied to my face. None of their pokemon can cause the destruction here. No combination of their pokemon could cause the destruction here. Something else happened, and they're not sharing. I don't know why, and I don't know what they're up to, but I don't like it. I don't usually talk to Bugsy off the clock, so they might notice if I go talk to him today. You're with him fairly often, though; often enough that Scott's been complaining about it, anyway. So, please let him know, all right? And just in case, don't tell anyone else."

Uncertainly, I nodded. "All right. That's...I don't know what to make of any of that, but I'll do it."

"Good man. Now then, let's get you properly embarrassed before we go back in, shall we? Need to be convincing about this, after all."

Before he even began, I started blushing.


End file.
